The eighth session of the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea met in Geneva from March 19 to April 27, 1979. It resumed in New York from July 16 to August 24, 1979, with the first three days devoted to informal consultations.

The United States military potential may be viewed in two interlocking dimensions. The first is nuclear deterrence: the maintenance of a posture designed to deter other states with nuclear military potential from nuclear adventures. The second is comprised of nuclear and more conventional capabilities, designed to communicate to the widest spectrum of adversaries a capacity and willingness to exercise coercion in different settings in order to protect vital national interests.

The negotiations at the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea have been the most important catalyst of this century for a new legal and political order for the oceans. The conference, together with its preparatory work within the “Seabeds Committee,” has indelibly stamped ocean perspectives. Even without a widely acceptable, comprehensive treaty the influence of these perspectives on state practice will be profound—indeed, it already has been, for example, in legitimizing 200-mile coastal fisheries jurisdiction. If the conference is able to clear the remaining hurdles, particularly that of deep seabed mining, the new treaty is likely to govern oceans law for the foreseeable future.

During the current political era, which has been marked by the attempts of the two superpowers to abate the economic and political burdens of their intercontinental and other “military build-up” through mutual dialogue (e.g., SALT, MBFR) and to achieve a certain détente in their relationship, a government came to power in the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) after the 1969 parliamentary elections, whose declared goal was to make its own German contribution to help bring about a relaxation in international tensions, secure the peace in Central Europe, and make life there more tolerable for its inhabitants. The effort was all the more important because Germany was and is the only place on earth where the United States and the Soviet Union face each other directly. Initially, this political goal, securing the peace by relaxing tensions, was effected by the establishment of an extensive system of international treaties, usually between the Federal Republic of Germany on the one side, and the states of Eastern Europe with Communist governments on the other. Only to the extent that Berlin and the rights of the Allied powers of World War II were affected, were the three Western occupying powers (the United States, the United Kingdom, and France) included in the system of treaties, partly by exchanges of notes and partly directly (e.g., the Berlin Quadripartite Agreement).